Total Pageviews

Thursday, 6 November 2014

What Landed At Gatton? Or: Watch Out What You Investigate

Note: 17th August 2017Since first writing about this incident it has caused me more than a few (official) problems. I expect more after this re~post but I am not in this to make friends ~official or otherwise.~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

Sadly, since writing this piece I have heard that John Green has passed away. In fact, John died before he could send me photographs of the area he had taken along with witness statements and his own account of a rather official interrogation regarding his own investigation at Gatton!

On a quiet Sunday afternoon the last thing you ought to expect is to
become embroiled in yet another UFO mystery.Well, unless you are me that is.

In February, 2004, I answered the telephone to find it was Squadron Leader
“Colin Tarr”, who had been an associate of Air Vice Marshall Sir Victor Goddard
and Admiral of the Fleet Lord Peter Hill-Norton, and knew as much about the AOP
Bureau as I did –and then some. I had never met Tarr nor spoken to him but he
knew all the case reports we had sent to the Ministry of Defence as well as
about reports that never got submitted
officially.When he initially contacted
me I had thought it a hoax but he’d proven his connections easily.For that reason when he asked “Fancy hearing
something interesting?” I was interested but replied “I am retired now,you
know” which got a loud laugh followed by “No such thing, old boy!”

I was told that something unusual had happened in 1999 near to a place
called Gatton, in Shropshire.Some rough
details were given but I pointed out that what I was being told amounted to not
much at all.“Wait a day or so and
you’ll be contacted by a field officer –he’ll give you the details.”

Surprisingly, the person who contacted me I already knew so it wasn’t
long before I had all the pieces.

Around September 1999*, at approximately 15:15 hours and in good, clear
daylight, a large number of observers including hill-walkers, horse-riders and
botanist Nora Hill, saw a low-level flying discoidal object.Walkers on Stiper Stones,were able to look
down at the object as it passed and reported that the top of it looked “like
mother of pearl.”Colouration –possibly
markings?—were reported.The object was
seen to land “heavily” and remained on the ground for some 6-7 minutes before
ascending into the air and flying off.

Looking at the information later supplied to me helped to conclude that
there may have been a strong electro-magnetic field present because particles
kicked up by the object created a circle around it.

This would just have been another “UFO landing” had it not been for what
happened next.A local RAF man had
mentioned that a team had been to the area to check things out and talk to some
witnesses.The RAF man immediately asked
the Field Officer not to mention
this, however, when another officer mentioned the team it was considered an “open
fact”.

The Field Officer contacted the base in question –MoD Boscombe Down. The
MoD Boscombe Down is an aircraft testing site located south of Amesbury,
Wiltshire. And it is run and managed by QinetiQ; the company created as part of
the break-up of the Defence Evaluation and Research Agency in 2001 by the UK
Ministry of Defence. It is the home of the Empire Test Pilots' School.

At the time of the Gatton landing it was known as RAF Boscombe Down and
since 1939 had evaluated aircraft for the British armed forces and a lot
more.The Field Officer identified
himself and requested confirmation that a team had been sent to
Shropshire.There was a delay as someone
else was passed on to field the call.This personasked a few
questions and then stated: “We don’t just send people out anywhere you
know.We are a busy establishment and I
can’t recall anyone mentioning Gatton.”After an apology for not being able to help the conversation ended.

The Field Officer told me that it had been very interesting because: ”I
never once mentioned Gatton –just an incident in Shropshire!”Made me wonder.

But then came the task of talking to people.For this the Field Officer called on a well
known local man who had worked with Customs and Excise as well as the police
and passed on local UFO reports, James Green.While the Field Officer was talking to Mr. Green, a warden responsible
for the area in question, the phone rang.The caller identified himself as “Dr. David Clark, Sheffield University”
–as it was a speaker phone the Field Officer confirmed this.Mr. Green was asked whether he could
investigate the incident and pass all thedata along to an address [a Post Office Box as it turned out]?Mr. Green agreed, though he was suspicious as
‘Dr. Clark’ had mentioned knowing that he’d visited the site.

The RAF team who had visited the site were reported to Mr. Green who had
not been contacted and vehicles had crossed land without permission.A Wing Commander who would not give his name
but claimed to be from the Flight Investigation Unit, Boscombe Down, denied Mr.
Green access to the area and stated that it was “for public safety”.

Green, and others, watched as coverall suited men began sanitising the
area; picking up anything that was not going into “odd looking vacuum cleaner
style devices”.A couple of other men
were using devices that could not be clearly seen.Site integrity was maintained until they had
finished and with a “thank you” they drove off.

All of this was duly noted down.The odd thing was that the object, according to all the witnesses, was far
too small to have been manned.

When I later spoke to Dr. David Clark, at Sheffield University, he was
brief and to the point: he had never
heard of the Gatton incident and had certainly not contacted Mr. Green.That was that.

Incidentally,there is no one else based at
Sheffield University called “Clark”/”Clarke” with an interest in UFOs.A request had been placed in with the report
Mr. Green sent to the address given which stated that there was “something”
that he didn’t want to put into writing so could he meet Dr. Clark?

He never received a response.

We could all speculate on who the caller might have been but it really
was not important to the incident.I
checked around, the Field Officer checked around and even Mr. Green tried his
bit but we all reached a dead-end.One
UFO group did claim that they were told “small bodies were removed and flown
off in a helicopter” but this was pure fantasy.

To my mind, once everything had been collated, it was quite clear what had come down in Gatton and then
flown away.A Remotely Piloted Vehicle
[RPV].The size and details seemed right
and similar devices had been tested for assessment as battlefield intelligence
gatherers.This was probably a far more
up-to-date device than the one that created a huge UFO stir when it was sighted
by a trainee pilot and instructor over Blackbush,Hampshire in the 1980s: that device
had originated at Boscombe Down.

I sent everything to Squadron Leader Tarr and washed my hands of the
whole affair.Why had I been contacted
to look into a “possible UFO incident” if it was known from the start what the
object was?To confuse the issue –or to
find out whether anyone had spotted something that might give a clue to why it
temporarily landed?

One thing I learnt with the AOP Bureau was that sometimes we were given
leads that led to non-UFO events and the data we gathered was obviously useful
to someone.So, if you read of a “UFO
crash” in 1999, at Gatton,Shropshire, you know what it really was!

*It
has been requested, for a specific reason, that the exact date is not given and I
have agreed.